I wonder what Miller was thinking waiting at center ice for the handshake?

[Sabre Dance]

 

Bottom line is he did get outplayed, and that doesn't cut it.

 

Yes it's a team game, but Miller wasn't making the saves when the team needed him to. You can't blow 2 - 0 leads twice in a series. He is their best player and he knew that the PP was a joke, so he needed to be better than Rask. He wasn't. Sadly.

 

It's hard to make the save when the opposing forward is left standing by himself next to/in front of the net. The reason Rask "outplayed" Miller is that the Sabres couldn't get point shots through and had no one in front of the net most of the time. Rask did play great, but he got lots of help from his defense and the Sabres lousy non-existant power play...

[Buffalo Wings]

That diving save he made on Grier is highlight material, but other than that, we didn't give him a lot he couldn't handle. That's for sure.

 

GO SABRES!!!

Right...just imagine if that had gone in. We'd be talking about Game 7 tomorrow night - probably around the same discussions currently going on, but we'd still be talking about Game 7 and hoping to survive this series.

[Claude_Verret]

Well I say this to anyone who will feel like joining me. Time to jump on the Sabres expansion cousins bandwagon and cheer on the Canucks.

 

At least now I don't have to worry about a Sabre/Canuck final.

 

No.

 

Now that the Sabres are out it's time to get the rooting hierarchy together. I can't root for a team to win their first cup before the Sabres, and for those that have won already I root for the team that has won more recently first.

 

East

 

1. Pittsburgh

2. Montreal

3. Philadelphia

4. Boston

5. Washington

 

West

 

1. Detroit

2. Chicago

3. SJ/Vancouver/Phoenix

[ntjacks79]

+1

 

Bottom line is he did get outplayed, and that doesn't cut it.

 

Yes it's a team game, but Miller wasn't making the saves when the team needed him to. You can't blow 2 - 0 leads twice in a series. He is their best player and he knew that the PP was a joke, so he needed to be better than Rask. He wasn't. Sadly.

+1. Definitely agree. But I didn't expect to be seeing this sentiment on the board today. I thought it was heresy to say such things... but I sure was thinking them. ;-)

[Stoner]

Damn, agreeing with you twice in the same thread. Yikes.

 

Three times and you die, like falling and hitting the ground in a dream.

[Stoner]

I'm glad you said almost any goalie, because I never once in this series saw Rask have to make the saves Ryan had to. They never tested him once. Rask wasn't better than Miller, but the Bruins were definitely better than the Sabres.

 

They never tested Rask? OK.

 

What about Dean Rusk, JFK's Secretary of State?

[SwampD]

They never tested Rask? OK.

 

What about Dean Rusk, JFK's Secretary of State?

I'm pretty sure that Lindy was coaching the Sabres back the as well, so no, him either.

[bob_sauve28]

I love watching the hand shake at the end of a series. It really is a great hockey tradition and we do it in our league at the end of every game. Kind of a nice touch to remind everyone its just a game we all love.

 

But this year the hand shake between Sabres and Bruins seemed more cordial than usual. The olympics? Saw Miller and Thomas talk a long while, and Chara and Sakara hugged, as did a few other people it seemed.

[bunomatic]

Miller wants to win more than anyone on this team.Everyones trying to read into the leadup to the handshake and will he request a trade if...blah blah blah.He signed a long term deal with his own hand.He's sleepin in the bed he made.Regier must have told him they would get the pieces necessary to win it all and Miller believes him.Maybe they will,maybe they won't but miller signed a contract.I think he'll honor it.

[Supersabre]

Another season has come to an end and we can't get past the first round.....again!!!!

 

To me is was a look of frustration. Almost like I'm sick of this. I want a Stanley Cup Championship!

[R_Dudley]

I don't know how much I want to lionize Ryan today -- the man standing alone, the wind blowing into his face, the lone rock of Gibraltar upon which...

 

He was outplayed by Rask. He played well, for sure. But he wasn't at the very top of his game. 2.34 against the league's worst offense? Not good enough. Sorry. (And please don't tell me how many great saves he made. That goes without saying for almost any goalie.)

 

I will not argue this point because I agree.

 

+1

 

Bottom line is he did get outplayed, and that doesn't cut it.

 

Yes it's a team game, but Miller wasn't making the saves when the team needed him to. You can't blow 2 - 0 leads twice in a series. He is their best player and he knew that the PP was a joke, so he needed to be better than Rask. He wasn't. Sadly.

 

And to both your and PA's points I think he knew that. But I also bellieve he knows he gave it all he had. I am not making excuses for him but he set a season record for games played and a lot of us recognized he was overplayed going into the last several weeks of the season.

 

This is on the coach and Management that relies on a goalie to get you to the playoff's and not enough of a team behind him to carry some of the load.

 

We all have seen what happens when a goalie gets hot in the playoffs (roloson with edmonton, this year Halak with Montreal,) if coach cannot manage his players and put them in the best position to be successful then he really is not a very good coach. Thats were I am with LR right now.

 

Ryan doesn't need to apologize or owe me or anybody else here on this board anything. As Deluca stated in November he was the reason this team made the playoffs in the first place. Now management should know they cannot try and get 70+ games out of their goalie in season they want to go deep into the playoffs.

 

I love watching the hand shake at the end of a series. It really is a great hockey tradition and we do it in our league at the end of every game. Kind of a nice touch to remind everyone its just a game we all love.

 

But this year the hand shake between Sabres and Bruins seemed more cordial than usual. The olympics? Saw Miller and Thomas talk a long while, and Chara and Sakara hugged, as did a few other people it seemed.

 

It seems to me this year more than ever that the player's realize it's a business and for us unfortunately too many of our Sabres players think thats all it is and forgot what the holy grail of hockey is all about winning the Cup.

[hopeleslyobvious]

It's hard to make the save when the opposing forward is left standing by himself next to/in front of the net. The reason Rask "outplayed" Miller is that the Sabres couldn't get point shots through and had no one in front of the net most of the time. Rask did play great, but he got lots of help from his defense and the Sabres lousy non-existant power play...

 

I'm with you on this one. Granted, I missed quite a bit of this series. Being 13 hours ahead means most of the games are on while I'm at work, but from what I did see, Rask didn't exactly see a ton of high quality shots. Besides, PA will always blame Miller:P

[Stoner]

I'm with you on this one. Granted, I missed quite a bit of this series. Being 13 hours ahead means most of the games are on while I'm at work, but from what I did see, Rask didn't exactly see a ton of high quality shots. Besides, PA will always blame Miller:P

 

Bulletin from President Roozavelt to Japan: elite goalies stop high quality shots, especially when it really counts. And Rask made a lot of very big saves at big moments.

[Mark from Albany]

"Note to self: Demand trade at end of next season."

[Wraith]

Which would be easier if the rest of the team didn't immediately start coasting once they got the 2-0 lead.

 

Please. Blowing the 2-0 lead in the series-defining Game 4 is almost entirely on Ryan Miller. He was too aggressive on the power play goal and was caught out of position when the first shot got blocked. I don't think I even have to explain how weak the second goal was. The Sabres played inspired hockey that day and if Miller doesn't have a really crappy 10 minutes the Sabres are probably in the second round.

 

It's really popular to blame the skill guys but the real story is this: The Sabres had leads in 5 games and blew 3 of them, had 2 goal leads in 3 games and blew 2 of them, and the Sabres vaunted penalty kill suddenly sucked against an anemic Bruins power play. Miller is just as much a part of this failure as anyone.

[Stoner]

Please. Blowing the 2-0 lead in the series-defining Game 4 is almost entirely on Ryan Miller. He was too aggressive on the power play goal and was caught out of position when the first shot got blocked. I don't think I even have to explain how weak the second goal was. The Sabres played inspired hockey that day and if Miller doesn't have a really crappy 10 minutes the Sabres are probably in the second round.

 

It's really popular to blame the skill guys but the real story is this: The Sabres had leads in 5 games and blew 3 of them, had 2 goal leads in 3 games and blew 2 of them, and the Sabres vaunted penalty kill suddenly sucked against an anemic Bruins power play. Miller is just as much a part of this failure as anyone.

 

Your best penalty killer is your goaltender!

 

Sez Harry.

[biodork]

Maybe he was REALLY just thinking, "Damn, now Noureen is going to make me shave my sweet stache."

[Jman04644]

There are three reasons why we lost.

 

1)Powerplay 0-19 makes me sick, I think Boston had more shorthanded breakaways than we had scoring chances on the powerplay. Watching our power play made me angry, the passing was god awful. I love the Sabres to death as I wached most of them come up through Rochester but we have to do better on the PP.

 

2) After going 30-0 (estimate) in the regular season when leading after two periods, you can't lose two out of the 4 games when leading after two periods not to mention we blew a two goal and three goal leads.

 

3) The huge thing that killed us was the Boston Forecheeck it seemed as though everytime they dumpmed the puck in the offensive zone they would come up with it. They won every battle every loss puck and every scrum. I size and speed killed us, I hear some say the toughness of our team but we did out hit them in almost every game. We need to be stronger on the puck in our defensive zone if we want to make it past the first round next year.

 

We have a great team and I believe in them. The loss is hard to swallow as I really thought we had a chance to win this season.

[wjag]

I am a newbee to this board, but it looked like nothing more than he just wanted to get it over with and get the H-E-Double-Hockey-Sticks out of there.

I'll go with that.

[Marvelo]

I don't know how much I want to lionize Ryan today -- the man standing alone, the wind blowing into his face, the lone rock of Gibraltar upon which...

 

He was outplayed by Rask. He played well, for sure. But he wasn't at the very top of his game. 2.34 against the league's worst offense? Not good enough. Sorry. (And please don't tell me how many great saves he made. That goes without saying for almost any goalie.)

 

Not too many people have said this but it's true. He was outplayed by an $850,000 goalie. I don't think he stole us any games. And he'd probably wants that goal by Bergeron back. Sometimes Ryan is great...and sometimes not so great.

 

As for leadership, the Sabres don't have any, just guys who wanna get off the ice.

[Stoner]

Not too many people have said this but it's true. He was outplayed by an $850,000 goalie. I don't think he stole us any games. And he'd probably wants that goal by Bergeron back. Sometimes Ryan is great...and sometimes not so great.

 

As for leadership, the Sabres don't have any, just guys who wanna get off the ice.

 

Speaking of a lack of leadership, Miller called his team "fragile little kids" late in the season, and midseason, he said he had been pissed off "for months." The season comes to an end, and all he does is ball-wash his teammates. Maybe the other day was the time to express more completely what his view of the team really is.